Love Potion No 328674
by nabikitendos
Summary: Harry Potter!AU It comes as a surprise to no one that Akane is awful when it comes to potion-making. Maybe getting some extra help from her friend Ranma would help her.


So this is for the Rankane Exchange Event 2017 organized by tendomojo on tumblr! I got lucky and was able to write for my pal nannichuan who asked for a harry potter!au so I hope you all enjoy it!

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As Akane once again laid in the hospital wing for the fifth time that school year, she decided. Potions absolutely sucked.

Every single potions class she had she could never figure out how to get it right. She swore she got the recipe right, but every potion she made ended with disastrous results; at best it ended with a mild boiling-over and a shouting match against Professor Snape back when he was teaching the class, a match she always lost. At worst it landed her in the hospital wing for a night, like she was right now. Tonight her arms were covered in burns from shielding her face from an explosion of the boiling slime that ended up being her potion. She wasn't alone for the night at least. Her friends and fellow Hufflepuffs, Yuka and Sayuri, were with her at least. Everytime she ended up in the hospital wing overnight the two would sneak in and keep her company for most of the night, usually ignoring the homework they were supposed to be doing, which was the only reason the two were allowed to stay in the hospital wing with her so late.

Akane sighed. The pain from the burns seized when Madame Pomfrey put some kind of salve on her arms, but they felt tingly and started to itch. She flexed her hands in front of her, trying to keep herself from scratching.

Sayuri watched her movements. "You know, Akane," she started but was interrupted by the injured witch.

"Don't."

"You don't even know what I was going to say!"

"You were going to tell me to get a tutor for potions." Akane said bluntly.

"Well… maybe you did."

"She's right, though." Yuka interjected. "You're going to fail your potion OWLs at this rate."

"So? I just won't be a potions master then, big deal." Akane leaned back in the hospital bed. "Besides, we still have have more than a semester before then."

"At least with a tutor you won't end up in the hospital wing every other lesson!" Sayuri nearly shouted from concern. A student a few beds over who was in from a quidditch injury groaned in annoyance. She turned red and lowered her volume to a whisper. "Would you just think about it?"

Akane had thought about it before, after literally every potions lesson she had since she entered Hogwarts, but her pride and stubbornness would never let her admit to this weakness. It didn't matter to her anyways. This would be her last year of potions ever, since there was no way she could suffer through an advanced class. Although it would be nice to make one successful potion, or at least not end up in detention or the hospital wing.

As Akane mulled it over, Yuka grew a sly grin on her face and rested her chin in her palm. "You know who would make a great tutor?"

Akane's eyes widened. "No. No no no no no. I know what you're gonna say, and the answer is no."

"Are the two of us really that predictable?" Sayuri asked.

Yuka ignored her and argued. "Come on, Akane, just give it a chance! I'm sure he's a great tutor!"

"What does he even know about potions?!" Akane's voice got louder. Sayuri hushed her friends, wanting them to quiet down before Madame Pomfrey kicked them out.

"He took the class before," Yuka reasoned.

Akane huffed. "Not with Slughorn."

"It'd be nice for you to spend more time with him. Alone." Sayuri added in. Akane blushed and opened her mouth to say something, but her friend continued. "Look, we'll leave you alone about this. If it helps, though, I'm sure Ranma would want to spend more time with you too. Just think on it a little more."

And think about it she did, for most of the night, in fact. Akane laid in the bed awake long after her best friends left her for the dorm, trying to keep from scratching at her healing burns. Perhaps studying with Ranma wouldn't be the worst idea, she thought. It would be nice to spend more time with him away from all of their other friends.

Ranma Saotome and Akane had an odd friendship. The two had a tendency to argue with each other, sometimes over nothing, sometimes because he was being a jerk (at least that's what she would say). But when they weren't fighting, they truly enjoyed each other's company. They were fairly close with each other. Ever since he and Akane's sister Nabiki started at Hogwarts both of their families usually spent their summers together, as their father's were apparently old best friends. She used to hate when the Saotome's would come over to her home. She thought Ranma was an obnoxious brat and that his father was a lazy slob. But she supposed she got used to them, or at least she did with the younger of the two, as they barely left each other's sides when the school year ended.

Unfortunately, it seemed as though now the only time they could spend together was during school breaks. Akane was a year below Ranma and he was in a completely different house; Slytherin. Now she was studying for OWLs and he was busy with quidditch and actually trying to work on his studies for once. Only 3 months into the year and they haven't hung out once. Not even at Hogsmeade. The most time they spent together now was a passing by in the hallway and a quick 'hey.'

Akane closed her eyes. She missed him. She couldn't believe she was saying it, but she actually missed his presence. She even missed fighting with him. She sighed. Guess she knew what she had to do tomorrow.

Except she didn't think she could do it.

Akane walked mechanically towards the quidditch pitch, where she knew the Slytherin team was practicing at that very moment. She knew this was partially an excuse to see him, but she hated the idea of what she was doing, having to swallow her pride and admit that she needed help. Especially to Ranma. He'd just make fun of her for asking for help from him and basically giving up. The thought of it made her mad and almost made her turn back. She was right outside the pitch now, staring up at the curtained entrance to the stands. She knew she wouldn't be able to go in and watch since Slytherin practices were usually a closed affair, and since she was on the Hufflepuff team (a beater) she definitely couldn't sit in. Maybe she could just wait outside the locker room for practice to end. She settled down on the grass and waited for the team to walk out. But the longer practice went on, the antsier she got.

This was a mistake, she thought. She'll just get help from an older Hufflepuff. Maybe Mousse can help her. As she got herself up from the ground and started to hurry away from the pitch, she heard a familiar voice say, "Akane?"

Akane jolted to a stop. Ranma was behind her, probably wondering what she was doing here.

Well, it's too late to back down now, she supposed. She took a deep breath, turned around with her head held high and marched over to him, past the Slytherin filing out of the locker room who were giving her some questionable looks.

She stopped right in front of him. "Ranma," she said with all the confidence she could muster.

"Akane," said Ranma. "Were you spying on our practice?"

"Of course not," she defended. "Why would I want to anyways? I've seen you get hit by a bludger to last a lifetime."

"Hey now…" He glared and pouted at her.

"I'm here for a different reason." She took another breath. "I need your help. With potions." Ranma opened his mouth to respond, but Akane kept going. "I know you've already taken the class and did pretty well in it, but I'm not doing so well-"

Ranma snorted and Akane glared at him. "Shut up, I'm not done. I'm tired of constantly ending up in the hospital wing over a stupid class and I want you to help me." As she finished, she stared at him and wrung her hands behind her back to hide her nerves.

Ranma leaned against the broomstick he was holding. "What's in it for me?"

"What?"

"No offense, Akane, but you aren't exactly the easiest person to work with. If I'm tutoring you, I want something out of it."

Akane almost told him off for being rude and wanted to tell him to shove his broomstick somewhere where the light doesn't shine, but stopped herself. She knew she could be hard to work with when it came to potions and even cooking. One of the ongoing jokes in Hufflepuff was that the reason Snape dropped potions was because he was tired of shouting at her for melting cauldrons. Instead of yelling, she huffed and said, "I'll treat you at Honeydukes next time we go to Hogsmeade."

"Deal," Ranma said immediately.

"Really? That's all it takes?"

"Hey, don't be mean to your new teacher. 50 points from Hufflepuff."

Akane tried not to laugh. "Shut up, you jerk."

The two decided they'd meet in the potions lab after classes ended and before dinner started on Mondays and Tuesdays. No one used the lab after classes ended and they'd have access to the ingredients Slughorn stored in the adjacent room.

Ranma waited inside the empty room for Akane to show up. They promised to meet up right when he got out of class that day, but she was apparently running late. Leave it to Akane to keep me waiting, he thought to himself and slumped in a chair. A moment later he could hear footsteps quickly coming towards the classroom. He hid under the desk in case it was someone other than his friend, but it seemed it didn't matter because Akane popped her head in and called out for him.

Ranma crawled out from under the desk. "Couldn't you try being a little more on time, Akane?"

She entered the door fully and he could see the cauldron she was carrying. "Keep complaining and I'll take back your payment." She hefted her cauldron (brand-new) onto the desk where Ranma stood and dumped out it's contents of cauldron cakes. "I went to the dorms to get my cauldron but I figured I should stop by the kitchen as well."

Ranma tried not to drool. "You're forgiven."

"You're such a glutton."

"And you're an enabler." He said and took a bite out of one of the cakes.

She rolled her eyes. "So, what do we do first?"

"Hm?" Ranma swallowed the cake. "You are going to make the draught of peace. Figured it would help once exams came around." He smiled. "It only needs 4 ingredients so I'm sure even you can't mess it up."

Akane glared. "Because you're teaching me, I'm gonna let that slide."

She got the ingredients she needed; moonstone, unicorn horn, porcupine quills and syrup of hellebore. She put the syrup to the side, and ground up the moonstone to a fine powder under Ranma's watchful eye. She looked away from her mortar and pestle into his eyes and was startled by how intently he was watching.

"If you keep looking at me like that your eyes are gonna fall out of your head."

"If I don't keep looking you're gonna mess up somehow and fry our faces off."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence," she pouted.

"Don't act like that. I know you, Akane, and you know too that if someone isn't paying attention you'll screw up."

"That doesn't mean you have to be so rude about it!"

"Just make the potion."

She huffed. "Fine…"

Akane looked at her textbook for the next steps. She added some of the ground up moonstone to her base and watched it change colors from white to green. Nothing exploded yet, so she thought she was doing good so far. She followed a pattern of stirring and adding more powdered moonstone to her concoction for a few more steps until she ran out.

She continued to follow the steps of the text until an idea came to her. "You know, what if instead of unicorn horn we used unicorn hair instead?"

Ranma looked at her bored. "No."

"Okay then what if we just put it in whole, or cut it up instead of grinding the horn?"

"No way."

"Why not? It's the same ingredient!"

"Because you don't know enough about potions to know what could happen!" He argued.

"Come on, Ranma, muggles do this all the time, don't they? Try and find a simpler solution to things? Maybe the if we just break up the horn without grinding it, it'll turn out the same." She tried to reason.

"Do you know how stupid you sound right now?"

She turned red in anger. "I'm not stupid! I'm- I'm thinking outside the box!"

"Look if you wanna try it go ahead, just don't blame me when it blows up in your face!"

"Fine!" Akane took a hammer and smashed the unicorn horn, making Ranma jump. He glared at her and she stuck her tongue out at him in defiance. She added in her chunks on unicorn horn to the potion, and while it did turn the desired pink she wanted when she stirred it, it also became rather lumpy and harder to stir. Akane tried her best to follow the recipe to the T. When she came to the very last step, letting it simmer, she thought maybe if she could put the heat higher, than it would finish faster. Just as she put her hand on the dial to raise the heat, Ranma stopped her.

"Don't even think about it," he said.

"Why not?" She looked annoyed.

"Because it'll boil over, stupid!"

"Stop calling me stupid, jerk!"

"Then actually follow the directions!"

"I'm trying to find different solutions!"

"You're just taking the easy way out!"

"I am not!"

As they argued, they didn't notice that the potion was spilling over the top of the cauldron like Ranma tried to warn against. Akane turned away from him to continue working on it and gasped. She quickly turned off the fire from underneath it and stared dejectedly at the mess.

I'm hopeless at this, she thought.

Ranma looked at her and groaned. "Why did you even come to me for help if all you're gonna do is fight me on everything? I'm actually trying to help you, but nooo. You got argue everything I say."

"Maybe I just wanted to see you, alright?" She turned and yelled in his face. "Maybe I just wanted an excuse to hang out with you for the first time in months because I missed spending time with you!"

Ranma stared at her angry face utterly shocked. "…Oh."

Akane calmed down and turned red when she realized what she said. She turned away from him and tried to defend herself. "Don't get me wrong. I do actually need help with potions." She said quietly and nervously rubbed her arm. "I just came to you, because I wanted to see you more."

Ranma didn't say anything which worried Akane. She turned her head to see him just staring at her cauldron.

"Ranma?" She nudged him with her elbow and he turned to her.

"Eat a cauldron cake," he said suddenly. "Because we aren't leaving until we get that potion right."

Akane smiled.

The two ended up staying up well past curfew to perfect the draught. They couldn't talk above a whisper in case anyone happened to be walking in the dungeons, which turned out to be hard since they were arguing a lot. It was nearing midnight and they were on their sixth attempt at it. Ranma was falling asleep in his chair. Akane let the potion simmer and added the last few drops of syrup to the potion waiting for it to change colors once again. She stared at it for what seemed like forever. She remembered a muggle saying about how a watch pot never boils, but she felt it impossible to tear her eyes away from the pot. Until gradually, the potion turned from white to a bright turquoise. Akane couldn't believe it, could she have done it? Slowly she turned off the heat, and grabbed the spoon in the cauldron. She carefully brought it to her lips and took a tentative sip of the draught.

Akane froze. No way. There was no way. She did it. She actually made a potion.

She reached out to grab Ranma's arm to shake him awake. "Ranma! Ranma, look!"

Ranma jolted awake and fell out of his chair. He cursed as he stood up. "What happened?" He mumbled.

She dragged him to stand in front of the cauldron. "I did it! Look!" He stared into it dazed, unsure what he was supposed to be looking at. After a moment, he processed it and his eyes snapped wide open.

"You did it?" Akane nodded with a big smile on her face. He looked at the potion again and then back to her "You did it!" And without thinking they grabbed each other in a tight and happy hug.

Until they realized what he was doing and jumped apart from each other with their faces burning red.

Ranma cleared his throat and reached out his hand to awkwardly pat Akane on the shoulder. "Good job," he said without even looking at her.

"Thanks," she said quietly. She turned to him and told him, "I'm just gonna clean up here. You don't have to stay, I know you're tired."

"No, it's fine." He said quickly.

And so, together the two silently corked up the draught and cleaned up the cauldron once again as well as the crumbs of the now eaten cakes. When they finished, the pair left the potion lab.

"So, I guess I'll see you around the castle?" Akane asked.

"Yeah," Ranma said quietly. "And next week, too."

She looked at him quizzically.

"Hey, just because you got one potion down, doesn't mean you'll get the rest." He gave her a goofy grin. "And I still want that Hogsmeade trip."

She smiled back. "You got it."

The two wished each other goodnight and turned in opposite directions to their respective dorms, but Ranma turned back to give one final look.

Yeah, he thought. She has a cute smile.

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Fun fact: I wrote most of this in a Motel 6 bathroom in Texas


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